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In the small shuttlecraft, Namid was trying every button combination she knew (which wasn’t many, admittedly) to try and make the datapane display in something she could read. She was getting impatient with the piece of tech. Just before she dashed it against the floor, Elanor saw what she was trying to do and reached over and tapped a button she didn’t even know was there.

“What language do you require?”

“I don’t even know what this is!”

“Language detected. Performing translation to English.”

“What’s English?”

“Same as Englic, or close enough. Surprised us too, when we came back.”

“What do you mean, when we came back?”

“When we traveled wherever we did to end up here. The Harvest are sure that they traveled through time to simply take over their past. Some of our scientists think that we simply changed to a new universe instead. At least one says that time travel is impossible. I’m starting to believe them. Nothing is right.”

“What do you mean, nothing is right?”

“No dates line up, there are odd plants and animals, there’s a dragon, for Christ’s sake-“

“Who is this ‘Christ’ I keep hearing about? Some important figure in your history?”

“You could say that. That’s on the list too. Many consider him to be the most important person in history, but nobody here has heard of him.”

“It must be tough. I remember when I came over to this country, I didn’t know anyone except for the people I traveled with. I barely spoke the language. I hated it. I spent my time wandering as far as I could, but nobody knew the stories of my people, nobody followed our ways. I was so utterly alone.”

“So did Irian?”

Namid snorted. “Irian would still be speaking Cymru if left to his own devices. No, he didn’t but he wasn’t of the country either. I could at least talk to someone that somewhat understood, or so I thought. He didn’t talk much. Not that I blame him, it must have hurt forever when he got that slash across his face. my bowstring slapped me and just left a bruise and I didn’t talk for a week.”

“That scar is so unfortunate. He must have been good looking at one point.”

“I’ll remind you who he is to me, thank you. He’s just as handsome for it. But when I met him, it was still healing. It looked so much worse, and they were still afraid that he wouldn’t see again from that eye. I teased him mercilessly.”

“That was mean.”

“I didn’t know how to deal with him. I was trying to do anything I could to make myself feel better.”

“I’ve been there.”

“Is that why you kissed him?”

“No, that was something much less… what’s the word. I don’t know a good one. I just have to tell it from the beginning. Don’t worry, I’m not planning any of it any more. You’ll see why when I tell it. I need to get it off my chest anyway.”

So Elanor told Namid about what her father was really like, whereupon Namid started to understand a lot of what had transpired.

“Does my brother even know this?”

“No. When he said he wanted to atone, everyone took him at his word. His crimes were a world away, anyway. Some of us just knew better than to trust him. I wasn’t going to let him get such a powerful weapon.”

“Well, your man put paid to that, didn’t he?”

“Yes, he did. Now you know why I don’t hate him-he saved all of us. In the forest we found love, and now I have a personal stake in the matters of this world. I have no interest in harming anyone again.”

“All the same, I’m glad your first plan failed.”

“So am I.”

The two women laughed, the first time they had so freely in a long time.